Native American Innovations Beyond the Stone Age

Native Americans invented cough syrup centuries before modern medicine. They used the mullein

plant found across Missouri and Mexico to treat lung infections, digestive issues, and throat problems.

The stalks were even coated in wax to create torches because natives used every part

of every plant. Spanish conquistadors were shocked to find indigenous people using bronze

weapons and platinum artifacts when they arrived. The Incas were working with bismuth bronze,

a metal Europe wouldn't figure out until the eighteen hundreds. Meanwhile, the Old Copper Culture

in the Great Lakes was forging complex copper tools eighty five hundred years ago,

fifteen hundred years before Europe even started smelting. They created socketed tools with rivets